


Making It Real

by TMar



Category: The Matrix (Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-11
Updated: 2018-11-11
Packaged: 2019-08-22 04:17:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16590698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TMar/pseuds/TMar
Summary: Neo loves the only person he cared enough to save.





	Making It Real

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote this in 2000. Can't remember if I ever posted it anywhere. It predates both Matrix sequels and the Animatrix, so it's technically canon divergence.
> 
> Chinese version translated by ssabriel is here: https://m.weibo.cn/1375932120/4400276218150351

Making It Real

Even in the real world, in his dreams, he could still feel it: those split seconds when he'd known Morpheus wasn't going to make it; when he'd known that *he* had to make up the shortfall; when he'd done just that and their bodies had connected in mid-air as he'd saved the person who had dragged him from safe, artificial slavery into an uncertain, frightening, dismal Real World.

He loved him, he knew that now. And he dreamed that one moment over and over: seeing Morpheus jump, jumping with him, connecting... It had felt so good. Even knowing that it wasn't 'real', that it hadn't 'really' happened, didn't stop the feelings, or the thoughts, or the dreams. What had Morpheus said, at the beginning, when he'd fallen on his first time in the Jump Program? "Your mind makes it real."

His mind made it real. And he'd known that he could never let go. Not then, not during that helicopter ride, not now, not ever. What he felt was real. The Oracle had said it herself: being the One was just like being in love - no one could tell him if he was or wasn't. He knew he *felt* like the One, now. He had done what no one else had, and the future of the AI on the planet was bleak. One day there would be no more power plants, no more people with holes in their bodies, no more humans grown to power the machines. He knew that, because he was the One. And with that same sense he knew that he loved Morpheus.

He loved Morpheus. Technically, he supposed, they *all* loved Morpheus. Morpheus was one of the most valuable commanders in the Resistance. They were all loyal, all willing to follow Morpheus's orders without question. Yes, that was true. Any of them would give their lives for their leader in a heartbeat. They would *die* for him. Neo wanted to *live* for him.

To die for someone is always easier than to live for them. He knew this. Maybe being a martyr wasn't exactly easy, but in death there were no consequences. A martyr didn't have to look at his leader across a table every day and pretend that he didn't love him, or want him. Mouse had been right when he'd said that the body needs nourishment other than food. He had 'visited' the woman in the red dress, the one who 'didn't talk much'. He thought Mouse would probably have appreciated him taking him up on his offer, but it was hollow, because he knew it wasn't real.

Inside the program she was warm, and soft, and willing. It was pleasurable and his mind certainly enjoyed it. But it still didn't feel 'right'. He knew now when something was real and when it wasn't. He could detect the differences between Resistance-written programs and the AI-created Matrix and the Real World. He could do it retroactively, too, and all his memories were tainted with a sense of unreality... except for that moment when he'd caught Morpheus as he jumped from the building. Everything, up to his facing down on the Agents in the hallway, had that unreal sense... except for that one moment.

"Your mind makes it real." It was one moment he savoured, over and over again, in dreams and in the waking world.

"Neo."

Neo looked up, startled, at his leader. "Yeah."

"How are you feeling, really?" Instinctively, Neo knew that Morpheus must know there was something wrong. He had to.

"Tired." It slipped out as Neo watched Morpheus standing in the doorway of the tiny cabin on the ship he now called home.

"You should sleep."

"No."

"Dreams?"

Neo's face showed his surprise. "How did - ?"

"We all have them. We dream about our lives, before. Our families, people we loved... They'll get less as time goes by, you'll see."

"Morpheus." So much about the Matrix that was still unclear, so much he didn't know. "Our families - were they really our families? I - I mean, am I the child of the two people whose DNA was used to create me, or was I just slotted in to fit a couple who'd decided they wanted a baby in the Matrix?" 

Strangely, Morpheus smiled. "I don't know. There are some things we'll never know. We'll never know if the Agent was telling the truth when he told me there was a prototype Matrix that people refused to accept. We don't know - "

Again, "Morpheus."

"What is it?"

"What were you - inside?"

"Does it matter?"

Neo shrugged. "I guess not. I just wondered... I was a software designer. Trinity hacked into the IRS. Everyone seems to have been into computers..."

"I worked for the FBI."

"Whoa. Really?"

"There were all kinds of agents. There were the sentient programs, there were tracking programs, and there were many of us... normal humans who did the work that was necessary to keep the others in bondage. I traced people via computers, phone lines, paper trails... It was my specialty. And when I was freed, when I learned what the machines had done, I became a dangerous enemy. I knew what they were, how they worked. I had to be eliminated."

"I..." Neo couldn't say anymore. He didn't know *what* to say.

"Get some sleep, Neo. Try not to dream."

Neo just nodded as the door closed, leaving him in the cold cabin, alone.

***

"She loves you, you know," Tank said as they sat checking their progress. They and other Resistance cells had freed many more people, but it would take a long time before the entire population of the world was ready to be unplugged. Some would probably never be ready. Like Cypher, they preferred the safe, comfortable world of the Matrix.

"What?" Neo didn't look up, intent on his screen.

"Trinity. She loves you. I heard her say it."

Neo nodded. "The Oracle told her she would fall in love with the One."

"You should get together, man. Make some real babies."

"Is that even possible?" Neo finally looked away from the screen.

"Sure. You might have been grown for the Matrix, but your body is still one hundred percent human. Wouldn't that be great, to hold your own, real baby?"

"You have," Neo realised.

"Oh, yeah. She's there, in Zion, with her mother, waiting for me. It's a beautiful thing. You should have that."

Neo wondered what he could say. Trinity... there was something there between them, but he knew it wasn't love. She loved him, but...

"It's not like that," Neo finally said. "Between Trinity and me. It... I do care, but..." He shook his head. "I don't know."

"She'd be good for you."

Neo said nothing. He couldn't deny that.

"They're scared of us," Tank went on. "You said so yourself. We have time now. Don't hold back because of some bullshit. Grab what you can, man."

"Grab what you can," Neo repeated, to himself. It was good advice. Grab what you can. There is no spoon. Everybody falls the first time. Your mind makes it real.

Neo only wanted to be with the one person he couldn't have ever let fall.

***

Morpheus was worried about him now. He could feel it, sense it. He watched him, always watched him... And Trinity looked sad, vulnerable... He could never be what she wanted. He could never be *hers*, never be her love, her *lover*. And he didn't know what to say to her, so he said nothing. He could see it hurt her, but he had no idea what to do. It seemed he was as inept at personal relationships in the Real World as he'd been in the Matrix.

"What's wrong?" Morpheus asked him as they spent some quiet time resting before executing yet another plan to extract someone from the Matrix's slavery.

"I'm just tired."

"Cypher was tired," Morpheus said. The implication was clearly there.

"I'm the One," Neo said, meaning, I'd never do that.

"You're not just tired," Morpheus said, meaning, I know.

"No, I'm not. I'm thinking about Trinity. The Oracle told her she'd fall in love, and the man she loved would be the One."

"But the Oracle didn't tell her that the One would love her." Morpheus preceded him again.

"No."

"It's not your fault, Neo."

"I feel like it is."

"Some things are much harder in the Real World."

"You're talking about love."

"Yes, and other things."

"What other things?" He had to know. Morpheus would tell him. Morpheus would tell him anything.

"Desire. Relationships. A semblance of normality."

"I thought we didn't have time for normality."

"We have to have time. Otherwise it's all for nothing."

"'Grab what you can,'" Neo quoted.

"What?"

"Something Tank said. Grab what you can."

"Good advice. Are you going to?"

"I..." Neo looked down, away, anywhere but at his leader. "I don't think I can."

"You mean not with Trinity."

"Not with Trinity."

"Who, then?"

It was a simple question, nothing more. But Neo couldn't NOT answer it, anymore than he'd been able to refuse the red pill. "You. I want... you." He dared to look at Morpheus.

"Me." Morpheus didn't look surprised, but then he never looked surprised.

Saying it had given Neo courage. "I love you." When Morpheus didn't move he said it again. "I love you."

"I got you out of the Matrix." It was as close to an explanation as he'd ever get, Neo knew. And he knew it was the wrong one.

"No. The Oracle also told me... being the One is like being in love. You just know whether you are or aren't. And I am." He looked boldly into Morpheus's face.

"You want to give up a lifetime of conditioning to be with me."

"If by that you mean, have I suddenly turned *gay*, may I remind you that labels are created within the Matrix. They have no meaning in the Real World."

"This is what you dreamed," his leader suddenly said, understanding.

"Yes. Saving you at the Agents' building. I knew in that moment. It's the only moment I've spent in the Matrix that feels real to me anymore."

"Your - "

" - mind makes it real," Neo finished. "I learned that lesson well, Morpheus." And he smiled.

A hand came up to cradle his face. "I've never done this."

"You mean not here, in the Real World."

"Exactly."

"Tell me you love me," Neo said, drawing closer.

"I love you," Morpheus admitted.

They were only inches apart now. "Hero worship?" whispered Neo.

"Just love, whatever the source."

And then they were kissing, and it was wonderful, and alive, and *real*. Neo discovered that his real body worked just fine when it came alive with desire, need, want... They were standing now, pressed together in front of the consoles, aligned as they had been in that split second in the Matrix. "God, I want you," Neo whispered, drawing away slightly. "I want this." He pressed himself even more closely against his leader, his *love*.

He could feel Morpheus's right hand as it touched and learned him, even as the left one held him close, the way he had wanted since he'd first seen him. "Welcome to the Real World," Morpheus had said.

Neo leaned in for another kiss. "Welcome to the Real World," he whispered, and Morpheus smiled, their mouths fusing together even as that hand curled around him, squeezing gently.

He broke the kiss, gasping for air as sensations assaulted him. "I... oh God. I..."

"I'm here," Morpheus said, never letting go. "Just feel it. Feel everything."

Neo tilted his head back, breathing as though he was oxygen-starved, and let the sensations carry him away.

"I never felt anything like that," he said when he calmed. "Never."

"Machines can never know what this feels like," Morpheus said, withdrawing his hand. He held the sticky hand up to Neo. "Look."

He looked. Just sticky evidence... wait. His first time in the Real World. He knew what his leader was showing him.

"This is what they're trying to deny us, Neo. The ability to go forward, to create our own kind our way. This is what we're fighting for."

"Yes." Neo reached forward to return the favour.

Morpheus was beautiful in this, as he was in all else. And he was here, in Neo's hand, *alive*. Alive, warm, smooth, soft, hard... Morpheus' warm breath in his ear, the rumbling sound in his chest, the way he pushed into his hand... It was all life. All *real*. And the sticky warmth that pulsed into his hand was yet more evidence of their being alive, being human, being so much *more* than the machines would ever be able to comprehend.

They looked into each others eyes, and smiled. It was the first time Neo had seen Morpheus truly smile, truly seem to be happy. Neo held up his hand to his leader. Their hands joined, mixing the semen, the act having so much meaning that it was almost a physical sensation of joy.

"I love you, Morpheus," Neo said. "What I was looking for all my life... wasn't only the answer to the question. It was also this. Also *love*. Loyalty. Things that meant nothing in the Matrix."

"Things that mean so much more in the Real World. Like my love for you."

They walked together, quietly, to the ablution facilities. The water was warm and the soap was harsh, but Neo welcomed it all, delighted in it all. "What if the Oracle had told me the truth when she said I wasn't the One?" Neo asked as Morpheus' hand brushed lather across his back, across the evidence of former slavery. The question was twofold, the underlying interrogative being, Would you still love me if I weren't the One?

"You would have *become* the One," Morpheus said. "Because I *believed* in you. I always believed, and..."

"Your mind makes it real," Neo supplied, hearing the answer, 'To me you're the One *because* I love you.'

"Yes." Meaning, 'I loved you first.'

Neo pulled away, looking into those dark eyes, the eyes that had reached inside him from the first moment. "You always loved me," he said. "You loved me."

"I could see what the others couldn't. I could see *inside* you, in a way I can't explain. Even inside the Matrix, your true self called to me. There was no way I could ignore that call. I did what I did because... I had to."

The rough cloth scraped Neo's skin as Morpheus dried him, but he hardly noticed. "You said that once before."

"On so many levels, you were needed. Necessary. I needed you. The human race needed you."

"And I needed, too, Morpheus." Neo looked into his leader's eyes.

"I know."

They kissed; gently, experimentally, learning about being together this way, in the Real World. Then Morpheus broke the kiss and began to put on his clothes. Neo followed his lead, waiting for the next pronouncement.

"I think... I will never stop needing you." It was said in that same emotionless tone, but Neo felt the underlying desperation, the want, the... love.

"Sleep with me, Morpheus," he said. "Lie in my bed, with me, and let's hold each other. Let's be together, knowing it's real, that nothing can take away these moments. No matter what happens tomorrow, no matter what we do inside the Matrix, no matter *what*." Neo held out his hand. Morpheus grasped it, so tightly that Neo was reminded of that day in the helicopter.

They didn't speak on the way to Morpheus' small cabin, identical to Neo's; in fact, identical to all the others on the ship. Trinity was on duty monitoring the Matrix when they passed, but she did not look up, and Neo had no way to know if she'd even seen them. He didn't know which to hope for: that she had, and now knew, or hadn't, and remained in the strange limbo of their making. But there was nothing he could do for her, either way.

Morpheus' cabin was cold, but lying in Morpheus' arms made warmth spread all through him, warmth enough that they could both sleep.

They did not dream.

END


End file.
